Monday, June 29, 2015

[Review] Ted 2

The first Ted was obnoxious, but it might've provoked a few guilty pleasure laughs depending on the type of mood you were in. Either way, it definitely didn't seem like a sequel was needed, but it made a lot of money, so here we are.

Ted and Tamy-Lynn (Jessica Barth) are newlyweds. Flash forward a year later, and they're miserable. There's a shouting match scene between the two, and you can't help but think you'd get more amusement from one of the squabbles in an old "Jersey Shore" episode. Anyway, they decide to have a baby in order to repair their relationship (which doesn't actually sound like the best idea). Mark Wahlberg mostly just hangs around as a sidekick, sounding like a listless idiot until he finds out he's going to be the sperm donor, since Ted can't... (ya' know). This comes after a failed attempt at stealing Tom Brady's sperm in what is one of the only serviceable moments of comedy. But to make matters worse, Ted finds out from the court system that he isn't deemed a human being (who ever would've guessed?), and the rest of the film involves him staking his claim as a legal person.

A misogynistic teddy bear dropping F-bombs and making dick jokes isn't really a great source of humor. And a script full of low innuendos and cricket chirp-inducing gags just doesn't cut it. It all might appeal more to 7th-graders entering puberty, but for everyone else it's eye-rolling. The cameos don't really bite--they're just kind of there. Outdated pop-culture jokes litter the screen, so in a way it feels like The Marshall Mathers LP 2 of movies. And not to delve too deep into the characterization of Ted, but there's a scene when Ted is appalled after coming across Wahlberg's internet porn collection, and it just doesn't make sense for Ted's character to react that way. If you're going to have a movie revolving around a talking teddy bear, you might as well at least be consistent.

The best thing about this sequel is that the pacing is pretty fast and Ted's CGI looks solid, so it isn't a completely excruciating sit. However, much like Seth MacFarlane's last feature-length A Million Ways to Die in the West, Ted 2 is a one-note joke that has been stretched too far.